Originally Posted by
burnthesheep
Prove it then.
If the TT bike is the problem everywhere, give it a go.
Yes, on a survey a meaningful amount would say “don’t want to buy one”. But I’d bet an equal or greater would either say “didn’t know I could” or “too pretentious”.
I think both of us suffer a lack of data.
One data point irrefutable is that road racing is less popular per capita in the US, participant or spectator.
We’re both left with largely feelings and anectdotes, so grand soapbox to stand on claiming false equivalencies and slipery slope.
My bottom line is that for the US the culture of RR is to blame. Not the geometry of the bike.
Slippery slope argument is
If they eliminate TT bikes next they'll make guys race only on the hoods
False equivalency is
Obree built his bike with washing machine parts so guys should have no problem putting together a TT bike
"prove it," does not flow from pointing that out.
I can indeed prove that at races where they eliminated TT bikes they did not make the folks race on hoods.
And I can also prove that because a guy from the 90s who had bipolar built a bike out of spare parts laying around his house and won a world championship and set hour records will in no way impact whether TT bikes are a barrier to participation in TTs 30 years later.
By the way, geometry has nothing to do with it.
Lastly, the statement was
I know it isn't a popular opinion amongst the TT geeks, but I think it would be a better sport if they did away with TT bikes.
Since I was expressing my own opinion I'm not really thinking that I have any sort of obligation to provide a data set (particularly when it wasn't even what I was responding to). I won't be putting any surveys out in the field on this particular topic.